Imagine an America in which all
children are educated according to biblical, Christian principles instead of
modern, secular, liberal values. Chaplain E. Ray Moore (Lt. Col. USAR Ret.),
such a scenario is not just possible, but essential if Christians wish to
reclaim the American culture.
“We take the position at the Exodus
Mandate that the Scripture and sound theology teach that the education of
children belongs to the family and the church or private associations, not
government,” said Moore, the founder and president of Frontline Ministries,
Inc. and director of the Exodus Mandate Project. “We don’t believe that
government, even at the state level, has any role in K-12 education, and the
Scriptures are clear and explicit on this. There’s no wiggle room.”
In order to wake Christian parents
up to the dangers of public schools, Exodus Mandate has released a new
documentary called “Escaping
Common Core: Setting Our Children Free.”
The film is divided into two roughly
30-minute parts. The first part explores the origins of Common Core and the
history of progressive education, from Horace Mann through John Dewey through
the education policies of our past four U.S. presidents. The filmmakers argue
Common Core is the latest manifestation of the effort to impose a socialist
worldview on American children.
The second part of the movie offers
Exodus Mandate’s suggested response to Common Core, which is for Christian
parents to pull their children out of what Moore calls the “pagan, godless,
atheistic public school system” and either homeschool them or find a private
Christian school.
Moore, the scriptwriter and
executive producer, said Exodus Mandate saw an opening for this film because
Common Core has become a major national issue in the past few years.
“For the first time in our lifetime,
because of Common Core, K-12 education is being debated on the national stage,”
Moore told WND in an interview. “We saw an opportunity to kind of come in there
and ride the crest of the wave, with all these millions of dollars of free
publicity on the Common Core issue, to create a movie that would give the
Christian an answer to the problem.”
Exodus Mandate is the same group
that produced the award-winning 2011 film “IndoctriNation,” which also dealt with the history of the public schools and
their subversive, anti-Christian nature. However, that film came out before
Common Core was a major national issue, so Moore felt the need to do a
follow-up.
International journalist and educator
Alex Newman, coauthor of “Crimes
of the Educators,” offered hearty praise for “Escaping
Common Core.”
“It is exciting to see the makers of
the wonderful film ‘IndoctriNation,’ which featured a great interview with my
co-author, the late Dr. Samuel Blumenfeld, release their next documentary,”
Newman said. “I encourage everyone to see it and spread the word. The topic
could not be more important. As sad as it is to admit it, I agree with the
message of the film: Christians can no longer be a part of these government
schools.”
A threat
Indeed, Moore confirmed the goal of
“Escaping Common Core” is to make parents realize Common Core is a threat to
their children and they should pull out of the public schools in favor of
private Christian schools or homeschooling. The longtime chaplain lamented that
Christians have trusted the public schools for far too long.
“After 160 years or so, all the
garbage and debris and waste from this faulty model is washing up on our
shores,” Moore said. “And it’s creating a lot of anxiety and cultural, social,
and moral destruction in our culture. So we think it’s time to jettison the
model completely. Christians need to do that first, lead the way.”
Moore believes if Christian parents
set up a far-reaching system of private schools, many non-Christian families
would be drawn to them as well in order to escape Common Core. If this
happened, he said, more people would find Christ, which might spark a revival
that would renew American culture.
However, he said that will never
happen if parents continue to put their kids in public schools. “To think we
can win the culture war when a majority of Christian children are still being
indoctrinated in the public schools doesn’t pass the common sense test, much
less the theology test,” Moore said. “And so Christians are derelict and
irresponsible, in my judgment, if they continue to put their kids in these
pagan, godless, atheistic public schools.”
In the few weeks that “Escaping
Common Core” has been out, Moore said he has already met opposition from some
conservative Christians – the very people for whom he made the movie. He said many
Christians still hold on “almost like an addiction” to state education, even
though it’s harming their children.
“We’re still having to fight trench
warfare within our own camps to try to win over Christians and pastors,” the
former chaplain said. “Pastors as a group are pretty much AWOL on this issue.
Maybe 10 or 15 percent are engaged, but 75 to 80 percent won’t touch it because
they have so many public school people in their churches still, and they know,
you get a disgruntled group, you’re history. So they really are putting their
job security ahead of taking care of their flocks in many cases.
‘Pagan education’
“It’s time the pastors step up and
be the shepherds of the flock that God’s called them to be in this particular
area.”
Moore is adamant that Christians
don’t have permission to put their children in harm’s way under “pagan,
atheistic education,” as the vast majority of evangelical Christians are doing
now. He warned 80 percent of Christian children who attend public school
through their entire K-12 lives are leaving the church and abandoning the
Christian faith. Moore wants to see a change.
“If we would change our ways, in a
decade we could create a whole new private Christian and homeschool system that
would educate tens of millions of children,” he declared. “And then it could be
used as a way to evangelize and re-Christianize the culture.
“But so many Christians are still
locked into this faulty, absurd salt-and-light theology that their children are
in the public schools to be a witness for Christ, and actually what’s happening
is they’re being converted by the Left.”
Patrice Lewis, a WND columnist and freelance writer, said well-intentioned parents are
making a huge mistake by sending their children off to public school.
“Most parents want what is best for
their children,” Lewis said. “When they send their kids to public schools,
they’re making the erroneous assumption that those schools are educating
children with sound values. In fact, public education has become little more
than progressive indoctrination camps where dissenting opinions and a Christian
worldview are treated with hostility.”
Lewis homeschools her two children,
and she urges other parents to do the same. “The question parents must ask is,
who do you want to have the biggest influence on your children?” she said. “By
default – by simple mathematics – if your children spend the bulk of their
waking hours under the influence of public schools, they are far more likely to
adopt to morals and principles of those influences, rather than the morals and
principles of the people who love them the most.
“It’s not a matter of ‘detoxifying’
your children again and again every evening and weekend; it’s a matter of
making your life easier by choosing to keep them out of the toxifying
environment to begin with.”
Homeschooling growing
Moore approvingly noted the
homeschool movement is growing in America. Indeed, the number of children 5
through 17 years old who were being homeschooled by their parents rose
61.8 percent in the 10 years from 2003 to 2012. A total of 1,773,000 kids were homeschooled, representing
3.4 percent of the total 5-to-17 population.
In addition to homeschooling and
private Christian schools, there is a third option that gives Moore hope:
online K-12 education. He noted lots of middle class and working class parents
want out of the public schools, but they can’t all afford private school
tuition and some of them are not comfortable homeschooling. Within the past 10
to 15 years, online Christian education programs have given parents the chance
to school their kids according to Christian principles at home without having
to come up with lessons and curricula themselves. Liberty University and Bob
Jones University are two examples of colleges that offer “online homeschooling”
curricula for children grades K-12.
Moore also praised Apologia, a
corporation that offers Christian-based curricula for homeschooling families.
Apologia textbooks cover all the natural sciences as well as civics and
history.
“There’s just so many good things
out there now,” Moore exclaimed. “There’s no excuse for a family to put their
kids in a government school.”
These alternative forms of education
are important, Moore said, because government schools simply cannot be
salvaged.
“It’s important for conservatives
and Christians to realize that we cannot reform public schools,” he said. “It’s
a socialistic model. It’s the wrong model. You don’t fix socialism; you abandon
it. So many of our best people are still foolishly trying to reform that
system, and it can’t be done.”
He said trying to reform public
schools is like trying to teach a pig to dance: it doesn’t work, you get dirty,
and the pig gets mad. He believes the leftists who control public education
will never allow the system to be changed.
“A lot of Christians are protesting,
and you can’t defeat an evil power by mere protest and whining,” he advised.
“We’ve got to create a rival power, and the Left is just laughing at us when we
protest and talk about fixing government schools. It’s never going to happen,
so it’s time to give that model up.”
Reforming pointless
Newman agrees it’s pointless to try
to reform government schools. “If we are going to save and restore America, and
protect our children from evil and ignorance, that needs to begin with a mass
exodus of Christians from government schools,” Newman asserted. “They cannot be
reformed. They were, in fact, designed to do precisely what they are doing:
mass producing anti-Christian illiterates who lack even the most rudimentary
academic and critical-thinking skills but are experts on pseudo-science and
leftist ideologies. It is a crime of monumental proportions, and Christians can
no longer be bound up with these institutions.”
This fight is getting urgent, Moore
said. With the recent Obergefell decision, the Supreme Court legalized and
legitimized “same-sex marriage,” and now the chaplain worries public schools
will indoctrinate children with a pro-”gay marriage” mindset.
Also, in the Sept.
5 issue of World Magazine, Warren Cole
Smith reported on the College Board’s ongoing effort to revise its 37 Advanced
Placement (AP) tests. He wrote that the U.S. History exam in particular has
become more politicized with a leftward slant. For example, one anonymous
teacher told Smith a recommended AP textbook called “A History of Western
Society” devotes less space to John Calvin or Martin Luther than to
homosexuality and the acceptance of different sexual orientations, which it
considers a mark of Western civilization’s progress.
Conservatives see this bias as a
problem, according to the article, because the College Board operates as a de
facto monopoly, with no other organizations offering an alternative to the AP
exams at this point. And if teachers choose not to use the recommended
textbooks, their students are less likely to do well on the AP tests.
Moore fears the Left will use the
education system to push Christians “to the bottom of the economic ladder.”
The chaplain compared America to the
Egypt described in Exodus Chapter 1, when a new pharaoh who didn’t know Joseph
rose to power and enslaved the Israelites.
“Now humanists and pharaohs have
come forward in our country who knew not Christ and knew not the founding era
of our country,” Moore declared. “So we’ve got to break free and escape Common
Core and go to the promised land of Christian schooling and homeschooling, and
that’s what our movie’s about: escaping Common Core, escaping the tyranny of
this system, and setting our children free.”
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